Talk:Shyvana/@comment-24049414-20140107084440/@comment-7707879-20140116160809
@Myself v1.0: "The only "buff" she received was on patch 'V3.9', July from last year, not anytime near her sudden popularity. She has remained unchanged since then, and the only indirect buff she has received was the Trinity buff. I could count the Wit's end changes, but those happened before her "buff". Other than that, her jungle items have been nerfed or W can't proc anymore SotEL, and she has no sustain unless you build hp regen or lifesteal. Not to mention that calling "strong" a 2% of maximum health is just like calling the old Madred's "OP". So yes, it's pretty much exaggeration" A lot of this seems wrongheaded to me. I'm not sure why the word buff is in quotation marks, as if the claim that she (or her laning) was buffed is dubious. Most of Shyvanna's damage is magic, and magic damage is harder to build against early game than physical (negatron and potions is not a common starting build because it starves you of sustain). The 2% max HP per hit also helps her considerably in going toe to toe with the strongest and most prevalent tops in the game at the moment - Renekton, Mundo and tanky Rengar - of course it does, becuase they build and have high HP (aaaaaaaaw, it all makes sense!), so her old 15% armour pen would have done far less good for her than the new 2% max HP damage per hit in the current meta. The Trinity buff was NOT the only indirect buff she received, as I already said, the defensive and offensive mastery changes highly favour tanky champions (bye bye Wukong and Jax) because they make better use of them and there's less access to penetration unless you go deep in the damage tree, but doing so as a Wu or a Jax will not enable you to beat a Renekton, Nasus, Rengar or Shyvanna who takes defensive masteries and builds pure tank because you'll be too squishy. Clearly the fact that she's doing incredibly well in top means that she doesn't need sustain, what she has is enough, so the point is irrelevant. Finally, Madred's was strong, but expensive and subject to a weak build path, either way, who wouldn't want a part of it built into their kits for free? The point about her only just emerging is also very weak and adds nothing. Ezreal was considered weak for years even though he wasn't, and emerged as a very strong, even an overpowered pick (his W was nerfed severely). People didn't immediately pick up Shyvanna in lane because she was considered to be weak there for a long time, but when people tried it out they found her rather strong, that's all there is to it. It's an issue of perception vs reality, several champions have been underappreciated in the past. Riven was considered weak for a long time, after one of her nerfs there were many cries that she would be completely unviable, and people bought into the lie, but she recently blew up again and had to be significantly nerfed.